More Winterland Info

[LeftyStrat]

I had not read this before, sorry if this has been posted before:

http://reviews.harmony-central.com/revi ... +Head/10/1

This amp was the result of a conversation I had with Howard Dumble in 1968. At that time I was playing bass through a Sunn 200S with a 2 15" cabinet. Dumble asked me whay I chose the Sunn. I told him I had seen Jack Casady play through one at Winterland in San Francisco with the Jefferson Airplane and liked the sound. A month later, Dumble delivered two heads. They were labeled "Winterland" and were amps #3 and #4. He said to me" Iguess you'll beable to fill up Winterland now". The amp had 4 KT88 tubes witha Dynaco transformer and put out 220 watts at 8 ohms. It was loud enough. The amp was a single channel the volume, treble, bass and two boost swithes for treble and bass.

This guy claims to own #3 and #4 (though I think #3 sold on eBay some time ago).

This sort of suggests to me that the preamp at least must follow the Sunn 200s; volume, treble, bass, low boost and high boost.

However, the 200s uses one 12ax7, and a 6an8. I see three noval tubes in the shots on here. I could see dumping the 6an8 and going to a LPT, and it looks like V3 is set up as a LTP, but I'm still mystified about the other preamp tube.

The filtering looks to be similar to the Sunn. The Sunn used 30uf 525V before the choke, HAD uses series 60uf 350V. Following the choke, Sunn has three 20uf filter stages. Though there seems to be some other filtering added on the other side of the chassis.

The Sunn was tube rectified, Winterland uses silicon.

Man, wish these pics were just a little higher resolution, or that my eyes were better.

[LeftyStrat]

So now I believe that the second 12ax7 might actually be the LTP, and the third tube is some kind of drive before the power stage. It is not a cathode follower like the SSS or SVT.

The original Sunn 200s had parallel input stages driving separate bass and treble controls, with the treble side having an unbypassed cathode. HAD added a cathode cap but then lowered the plate resistor to 47k.

"Hey Lefty, like talking to yourself?" "Yeah, except when we get into arguments..."

[Fischerman]

Lefty,
I can't see the shots very well but it appears that there are 6 wires (not including heaters) going to the second preamp tube socket...since a LTP has the cathodes tied together then it would seem that IF that second preamp tube socket does indeed have 6 wires connected to it...that it's not a LTP. But I can't tell for sure how many wires are connected to that second preamp tube socket...so who knows.

[LeftyStrat]

You're right. V3 does have the cathodes tied together so it is probably the LPT.

So I guess V2 are extra gain stages. In one shot I it seems the tube shield for V3 is taller.

Maybe I should try emailing the reviewer on HC and see what info he's willing to share.

[dr. who]

fenderbassguy "I owned two Dumble Winterlands in 1968. They were built for me by Howard (Alex) Dumble. I was (and am) a Fender bass player. I had seen Jack Casady play through a Sunn 200S at Winterland in San Francisco with Jefferson Airplane. Jack showed me the Sunn and I bought a 200S shortly thereafter. About a year later, I was playing in a group and living in the Santa Cruz area of California. I met Dumble and he asked me what I liked about the Sunn. He was just beginning to build amplifiers and was a bass player himself. I described how the Sunn was powerful and filled the places I was playing and about the Winterland experience. About a month later, Dumble presented me with two bass amps. He was paid for his work by the band's investors. Besides two heads, he built a cabinet with 4 10" JBL D110F speakers and another cabinet with two JBL D140F speakers. As he delivered the amps and set them up, he said to me "I guess you'll be able to fill Winterland now!" The amps had the name Winterland on the front of them. They were the #3 and #4 of the amps he has built. I used #3 on a live album with Buffy Sainte-Marie. Each amp had 4 KT88 tubes with a rated output of 220 watts into 8 ohms. The fuse was an 8 amp slo-blo. A panel on the back of the amp allowed the user to select and output of 4, 8, or 16 ohms. The speaker outputs were Cannon 3 pin connectors that required special cables to connect to 1/4" speaker inputs. Amp #4 was pawned by my ex-wife in 1970. I kept and used #3 until a few years ago when I sold it to a store in Santa Cruz. The only modifications made to the amp are a banana plug installed below the Cannon outputs and a fan to keep the tubes cool. When the KT88s needed replacing, I installed 6550s and had the amp rebiased. The Winterland head was heavy at 63 lbs. It was a great amp; plenty of power, great tone, and constructed with pride and craftsmanship. I'm glad I had the opportunity to use it and I hope another musician is enjoying it as much as I did."

[boldaslove6789]

Man, wish these pics were just a little higher resolution, or that my eyes were better.

Where are these pics?

[Structo]

First I had heard that Alexander was a bass player.
Anybody ever hear that before?

[dr. who]

Here's the pics

[boldaslove6789]

I had read somewhere that HAD was a session guitar player for a while before he started building amps on the regular. I guess it didn't work out like he wanted it to and he had mucho connections with famous guitar players so there wasn't a shortage in players to try his proto's (Ala Lowell George, David Lindly, Jackson Browne etc. ) I guess that's why HAD spends most of his time in big league studio's fine tuning equipment.

As far as I know that is his real passion and that is why many players that own orig. amps (Or those that have been waiting a long time to get them) now cannot get anything done by him.

[Bob-I]

First I had heard that Alexander was a bass player.
Anybody ever hear that before?

Yes, he was a session bass player, amp builder and built vintage style firearms. His relationship with Buffy St. Marie was as her touring bass player for some time, not a romantic relationship as it has been reported in the past.

[Structo]

I thought that was Michael Husser?

[selloutrr]

I stumbled across the Winterland pics again today after a little research and cross comparing I found a Dynaco Output Transformer model / data catalog.

The winterland offers 4/8/16 ohm outputs running a quad of 6550/KT88
dynaco offers two OT's that put out 240 Watts but only one is rates for 6550 / KT88 at full power.

Dynaco A-451
2200ohm input Impedance
240 Watts output 6550 / KT88
4/8/16 ohm sec
5-7/8" x 4-3/4" x 6" tall

based on the dimensions I'm assuming the chassis is 10" deep 3" tall? how wide?

[Roe]

winterland sn 3 had dynaco a451: http://archive.ampage.org/threads/6/gag ... FYI-1.html

also: triode will release a a451 soon - its already on their webpage

[jon]

I find it amazing that the PT is only rated at 400ma[/code]